How Justified Sinners Love Each Other

Present Your Bodies to God

I am taking a slight detour from Romans 6 today in order to
speak from Romans 12 about small groups at Bethlehem. You might
say, "That's not a slight detour. That's major." To jump from
Romans 6 to Romans 12 is quite a leap. But really it's not. Let me
try to show you why.

In Romans 6:13 Paul says, "Do not go on presenting the members
of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present
yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as
instruments of righteousness to God." Notice the word "present":
Don't "present the members of your body to sin." Notice
the word "body": Don't "present the members of your body
to sin." And notice whom we are to present our bodies to: "Present
your members as instruments of righteousness to God."

Now keep those three words in mind and look at Romans 12:1,
"Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to
present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice,
acceptable to God." What does this parallel in terminology
mean? It means that what Paul began to do in chapter 6 he is now
doing in more practical detail in chapter 12. There is no big leap
from chapter 6 to chapter 12. Both of them are about how justified
people live and why they don't go on sinning that grace may
increase. Chapter 6 emphasizes the deeper, spiritual why,
and chapter 12 emphasizes the practical, nitty-gritty, daily
how.

Practical, Relational Life

So since today is our annual small group sign-up Sunday, I
decided to take this "slight detour" and pick up on the extension
of chapter 6 in chapter 12 and talk about the practical relational
life of justified sinners. The title is "How Justified Sinners Love
Each Other." My aim is to gather up some wonderful fragments of
relational Christian life from Romans 12 and call you to live them
out in love to each other this year in small groups – as well
as all the other ways that you relate to each other.

And when I say "each other" I am thinking not only of those who
are already here, or in your circle of acquaintance or even the
circle of Christianity. I am thinking also of those who will become
part of the "each other" from outside your circle and from outside
the faith. The term "each other" in a Christ-like, loving church in
a large metropolitan center like the Twin Cities is never static.
It is always changing and growing. It is a sign of serious
spiritual sickness in this city and this church if your circle of
friends is static.

So turn with me to Romans 12. It is filled with relational
instructions. If there is one immediate and easy-to-see message in
this chapter, it is this: Justified sinners live in relationships
and work hard to make those relationships durable and mutually
beneficial. So let's soak our minds for a few minutes in this whole
chapter to see if God would waken us to get joyfully serious about
being part of a small group this year and loving other people the
way this chapter teaches.

How Do Justified Sinners Love Each Other?

Start at verse 1: "Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies
of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice,
acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship."
There are about six great things worthy of notice in this verse.
But let's make sure we see two of them. First, notice the phrase
"by the mercies of God." All the practical instruction of this
chapter is to be pursued "by the mercies of God." In chapter 6 the
point is: Where grace has abounded, you don't sin to make grace
abound all the more. You present your bodies to God. Here in
chapter 12 the point is: Where mercies have abounded, you don't
conform to the world, you present your bodies to God to do his will
in relationship with others.

So another way to ask "How do justified sinners love each
other?" is to say, "How do people moved and carried by mercy love
each other?" What does a "mercy-moved" church look like? So this is
foundational. Don't miss it. The whole chapter stands under the
phrase, "by the mercies of God." Everything we are called to do in
this chapter, we do "by the mercies of God" – by the effect
of past mercies and in the hope for future mercies.

True Christians are a mercy-moved, mercy-carried, mercy-shaped
people. All our small groups should have this meaning: they are
meetings of mercy-molded people. We live by mercy and we
minister by mercy. All of us need mercy, and when we get it we
share it. "Freely you received, freely give," Jesus said, when he
sent his disciples out to minister (Matthew 10:8). We are sinners
justified by grace. We have our life because of mercy. And we live
by mercy. Friendships molded by mercy. Marriages molded by
mercy. Parenting molded by mercy. Civic responsibility molded by
mercy. Race relations molded by mercy. Neighborliness molded by
mercy. Vocational endeavors molded by mercy. Missions molded by
mercy.

What Does That Look Like?

Now what does that look like in relationships? That's what
Romans 12 is about.

Jump down to verse 9. I will come back to some of the
intervening verses, but look first at verses 9ff. No long
commentary on these, just look at them and ask how you are doing
and whether God might be wakening you to the joy and rightness of
being in a small group this fall.

No Hypocrisy

Verse 9: A life molded by mercy loves without hypocrisy. "Let
love be without hypocrisy." If we live by mercy, if our small
groups are meetings of mercy-molded people, our relational life
will be real, authentic, genuine. No sham, no fraud, no pretense,
no posing and posturing, no counterfeit, no duplicity, no deceit.
What you see is what you get. Love each other and be real.

We need small groups where people are real and where people are
safe. There are two reasons why we put on masks: one is that we
have not come to be satisfied in the mercy of God and so we fear
what man will think of us. Our inner life is not sustained by the
precious all-satisfying mercy of God and so we have to prop
ourselves up with the approval of others and that means wearing a
mask that they will approve. That's one reason we are
hypocritical.

The other reason is that we don't trust people to show us mercy
if we are real with our weaknesses and failures. Now, it probably
should not matter to us nearly as much as it does what other people
think of us – merciful or not. God is for us; who can be
against us! But in the real world, we are afraid –
right or wrong, that's reality. And we ought to show mercy
to each other. Small groups, Sunday School classes, and
conversations in the Commons ought to be mercy-molded and safe
– no fear of rejection, no fear of gossip, no fear of racism
or prejudice.

So when Paul says in verse 9, "Let love be without hypocrisy,"
he is calling for at least two things. One is that you be satisfied
in the mercy of God that you don't need the strokes and approval of
others. By the mercies of God, be free from craving approval. The
other thing Paul is calling for is that we be so molded by the
mercy we have received that we are springloaded to show mercy to
others. You might say, we should all be so content in the mercy of
God that we don't need mercy from each other. But that is not the
way it is. That's not the way God designs the church. Rather we
ought to say: let us show each other so much mercy that we all see
the reality of God's mercy in each other and become content in him.
That's the way God has designed the church. You don't become all
that you are supposed to be on your own and then bring that into
the church and your small group; instead you come into the church
and into the fellowship of justified, mercy-moved sinners and
become what you are supposed to be. Then you go out and display
that to the world.

We can't spend very long on each of these wonderful exhortations
for our relationships. In a few years we will, Lord willing, linger
long on these things. But let's get brief glimpses of some of
them.

Growing Affection and Honor

Verse 10: "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give
preference to one another in honor." In our relationships there
should be a growing devotion and affection for each other. It can't
happen in the same way for two thousand people. There have to be
smaller groupings where this can be lived out. "Brotherly love,"
"devotion" – these are not emotionless actions. They are the
growing affection of a good family. Let's draw people into the
experience of family. Young, old, married, single, rich, poor,
different ethnic backgrounds. Become family for each other. This is
what Jesus said would happen for those who follow him – you
will have "brothers and sisters and mothers and children" –
one hundredfold, if you follow him.

And then there is "honor." Verse 10b: "Give preference to one
another in honor." Yes, there should be growing family closeness
and affection. But intimacy and affection are not the only good way
we relate; there is honor. There is a dignity about every human
being created in the image of God that our culture does not know.
The most needy person in your small group is to be honored. And if
you say, "Ah, but the dignity is so distorted by sin . . ." you are
forgetting the heading of the chapter: By the mercies of God I urge
you,
Honor each other. Mercy covers the defects that have entered
into God-given dignity, and treats others with a sense of both
intimacy and honor.

Meeting Needs and Being Hospitable

And on and on we could go. Verse 13, "Contribute to the needs of
the saints." O let us become practical in our love, and meet each
other's needs. My car died Friday night and got towed to a garage.
I wanted it at home to work on. On Saturday, six or seven guys who
had attended the Desiring God seminar pushed it from Washington
Avenue to Sixth Street, until another got a rope to pull it with.
That is how justified sinners love. That is what mercy-molded small
groups do for each other.

Verse 13b: "Practice hospitality." Can you believe how broad the
scope of Paul's concerns are? From the heights and depths of
justification and original sin in chapters 1-5 to the common,
ordinary, glorious, all-too-rare practice of hospitality. Is your
home open? Single people, do you spread a table for friends and
couples? Married people, do you watch out for single people, young
ones, old ones, middle-aged ones? Do you put on a pot of soup
Saturday night so that you can pray for God to lead you to new
people on Sunday and ask them over for lunch (with Styrofoam bowls
and plastic spoons)?

Returning Good for Evil

Then there is this large emphasis in Romans 12 on not returning
evil for evil, but instead blessing those who treat you poorly and
doing your best, as much as it depends on you, to live in peace
with everybody. Verse 14: "Bless those who persecute you; bless and
do not curse." Verse 17: "Never pay back evil for evil to anyone."
Verse18: "If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace
with all men." Verse 21: "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome
evil with good." Why this emphasis on treating well those who treat
us badly? Answer: because that is what mercy means! That
is mercy! Whether we are a mercy-molded church will be
seen best in how we respond to our adversaries.

Well, you work out the rest of these specifics in Romans 12 of
mercy-molded relationships.

In Christ

I close by going back up to verses 4-5 to notice one thing.
"Just as we have many members in one body and all the members do
not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in
Christ, and individually members one of another."

Notice in verse 5 the phrase, "one body in Christ." "In
Christ" – what this means is that the union with Christ that
made it possible for us to have his righteousness (2 Corinthians
5:21) and be justified is the same union that makes it possible for
us become one body and be unified. Romans 8:1 says, "There is now
no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." So "in
Christ" our condemnation is taken away and we are justified. And
here Paul says, "We, who are many, are one body in
Christ." So "in Christ" we are justified, and "in Christ" we
are unified.

Because that's where the mercy is – in Christ. Without him
we are all hopeless and undone – unjustified, unacceptable,
unsaved, unforgiven, and without him we are without the
sweetness of mercy-saturated friendships. No Christ, no
righteousness. No Christ, no church. Therefore justified sinners
love each other with a God-ordained, Christ-created, mercy-molded
togetherness called the church – the body of Christ. And the
small groups of the church are meetings of mercy-molded
people.

I pray that you will be a part of one.

John Piper (@JohnPiper) is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary. For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is author of more than 50 books.

Share the Joy! You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in physical form, in its entirety or in unaltered excerpts, as long as you do not charge a fee. For posting online, please use only unaltered excerpts (not the content in its entirety) and provide a hyperlink to this page. For videos, please embed from the original source. Any exceptions to the above must be approved by Desiring God.